I needed help. I think I got scammed (not by United)
 

So I just bought the ticket yesterday night and then the next day I tried to cancel the reservation.
I then searched on google and dial the 1833 number which I later realize it was myflightsearch.com
and I spoke to them regarding of cancelling my flight. They told me I won't get full refund and I was
wondering why, since it's under 24 hours period, so I told then that I'll think about it. When I hung up the
phone and call United number that starts with 1866 number, the automated system couldn't find my
reservation any longer. So I went to United.com and search for my flight and it appears that the
website I called earlier have cancelled my reservation without my knowledge.

So I'm here looking for anyone who can assist me what I can do from here onward? Can I ask my CC
to dispute United charges? I paid over $1400 for the ticket and I don't know what will happen to it.
I appreciated for all the help.

Ask United what happened. Tell them you never authorized a cancellation. Verify if it was indeed cancelled. Maybe the indicative people you called first cancelled it for future credit, one of the options on united.com.

This would be similar to this thread:
https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/unit...ll-center.html

If you never authorized a transaction on the ticket with a third party line, it should be straightforward to dispute anything on the record as fraud, and have UA issue you a refund. It ideally shouldn't be possible for the funds to go somewhere other than original form of payment anyway - the other scams operate by charging your CC directly and then resisting any chargeback by claiming they were offering bona fide travel services.

Thank you so much guys. I'll try to speak with UA representatives now.

Much appreciated.

We're you aware that you were purchasing your ticket from a travel agent, and not directly with the airline? Perhaps the reason why you were not offered a full refund is because your travel agent charges a fee for cancelling tickets/issuing refunds.

Edited to add: Travel agents are not required to offer a free, 24-hour cancellation. From the U.S. Department of Transportation website:

"
What if I purchased or reserved my ticket through a travel agent or online travel agency?

• The refund/reservation requirement for airlines does not apply to tickets booked through online travel agencies, travel agents, or other third-party agents. However, these agents are free to apply the same or similar procedures to provide equivalent or similar customer service."
  

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I don't think that's what happened. It sounds like he book through United, and then when he decided to cancel he googled the number and ended up calling the fake number. At least thats how it sounds from the description. Not sure why he didn't just cancel online.

OK. Perhaps the OP can clarify if he did indeed book directly with United, or if he -- perhaps inadvertently? -- purchased the ticket from a travel agent.

This is the only thing that matters.

Exactly. We definitely need OP to provide more info. The only thing I can think is that if he called the wrong number by mistake but then gave them OP's name & conf #, then the person on the other end could have cancelled it and taken the credit and used it. As linked above, a similar situation has happened before.

If OP booked through an online travel agency then they may be SOL.

Right, my point is I don't think the scammer could have gotten the funds away from United, so if reported to UA as fraud they should be able to take care of it.

OP.

Your credit card company will be your best course of action.

You should contest the charge, tell them an online TA 'pretended' to be UA. Due to this deceit, everything else followed. ie not being able to cancel or them charging a cancel fee, etc, etc

Be VERY concise and clear. You wanted to buy a ticket from UA, but the company that charged the card via their relationship with the credit card company, was able to defraud you. By stressing that the original sin was their pretending to be UA, they may uphold the chargeback.

GL

report back

Except we don't know that this is what happened...

The key question is who did the OP originally purchase the ticket from?

Correct, unclear if the scam TA took any money.

All the OP mentioned is the flight was canceled (inappropriately by the scam TA) and the OP did not know what happened (if anything) to the purchase funds.

And as has been mentioned, how the flight was purchased is unknown.

So for now, without information, there are no chargeback circumstances. But a number of unknowns.
But calling UA was the place to start.

Hopefully, the OP was able to get UA to re-instate the old flight or refund the purchase to the original form of payment without penalty,